Today’s question is…
Can I rent/borrow your costumes?
I’m mostly answering this question so I have a post to point people towards when they do actually ask this – usually around Halloween, or people asking to borrow/use my costumes for Halloween parties/events, or fanfilms, photoshoots, etc.
I’m going to try to be as nice as possible in this post so don’t read any sarcasm or ill-intent into this.
Most of the people who ask me this question are coming to me from google. They may have very little idea about costuming/cosplay, so I’m going to start by giving a little background about that.
I’m a costumer. I do occasionally make costumes for other people but not very often – I’m a hobbyist. I like to sew and make costumes for myself, and wear them to places like sci-fi/pop culture conventions, or occasionally charity events or things like Free Comic Book Day. I will often times pour hours upon hours of work into a costume. It’s fun for me, I enjoy doing it. The end result – my costume – I consider to be artwork. I just work in fabric and beads and resin and wigs instead of paint or pencils or pastels.
I collect my photos of the things I’ve made and record my construction experience here on my website as a resource for other costumers or fans of the series. My site is not a store – I often get people asking “how do I purchase this” in the comments. This website is basically my personal portfolio of what I’ve created over the past 15+ years in the hobby.
You may get a brief, “No, I don’t rent my costumes,” if you ask me, or I may just not reply. It’s completely inconceivable to me, to let a complete stranger take something that I’ve poured my heart and soul into. Here is a breakdown of why the answer is “no.”
1. I don’t know you. At all.
I don’t even let my friends borrow my costumes.
2. I don’t know if my costume will fit you.
My costumes are made to fit me. Some of them are a little forgiving than others, but if I actually sent my costume to you and it didn’t fit, what would you do? Would you stick pins all on it to make it smaller? Cut it? Rip it? “I would never do that!” you’d say, but see, I don’t know that for sure – because again, I don’t know you!
3. I don’t know if you know how to put the costume on/take care of it.
My costumes are, again, made for me. So sometimes I may take some liberties with how things go on/attach. My Jane Porter skirt, for instance, is a puzzle. I had a hard time remembering how it went last time I wore it.
Even if I wrote them out a detailed description of how to put it on – how do I know they’d know how to take care of it in general? That this piece needs to folding into that for packing, that this needs to be hung up sideways to keep it from wrinkling? Things that I do automatically but would probably never think to tell someone else.
4. I don’t know if I will get it back in the same condition I sent it to you in.
See #2. They could be shorter than me, and they could step on the skirt and rip it. They could sweat a lot and sweat all over my costume. They could catch themselves on the side of a door and rip half the beading off. They could wad it up in a box to send it back and fedex squashes it and it’s broken beyond repair.
5. I don’t know where/under what circumstances you are wanting to wear the costume.
If they’re wanting it for Halloween, I’m betting they’re wanting it for some kind of party. Parties where there are drunk people spilling beer or red wine and running into people. If I wear my own costume to some place like that, I’m taking my own chances, and I’m being careful. The renter would have no emotional investment in keeping it safe.
6. How do I know I’ll get it back?
I’m not a professional rental company. I don’t have contracts and insurance. For all I know, the renter is wanting to pay me the same price they’d pay a costume shop ($100ish?) – and then who knows if they’d actually send it back ? What could I do about it? I sent it to them. It’s my own fault it’s gone.
I could come up with some kind of contract. I could make people give me an outrageous safety deposit that would cover the cost of the costume/my time ($1000ish in most cases….) but even then, it’s not worth it to me. My costumes are my babies.
7. To repeat… I don’t know you!
I really don’t know why anyone would think I’d hand over one of my hand-made costumes to them to borrow when they are a complete stranger to me, I just can’t wrap my head around it.
